


2 4 1

by Shiggityshwa



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Cam pov, Clava Thessara Infinitas, Clones, Clones galore, Established Relationship, F/M, Memory Loss, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pregnancy, Sequel to Bring it all Back, Vala POV
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-18
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2019-10-12 02:27:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17458847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shiggityshwa/pseuds/Shiggityshwa
Summary: The sequel to Bring it all Back--Six weeks into their new lives, old habits are running hard for Cameron and Vala. When a real chance to find the gate address to the clava thessara infnitas comes at a cost, what is worth the sacrifice? A little darker in tone than it's predecessor, but still runs true to character.





	1. For the Money

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to the long-awaited sequel to Bring it all Back. As summary suggests, this story will be a little darker in tone and deal with gender roles, PTSD, previous traumas, and memory loss. Later chapters will deal with multiple character deaths. If any of these subjects are upsetting to you, perhaps it's best if you skip the story.   
> Also I'm trying to come up with a name for the series, as there will be a third installment to finish it up. If you have any suggestions please let me know.

This is starting to get sticky.

There are rules to follow, rules unspoken among all free agents and their business contractors and although she is still relearning how to stand on her legs as an agent in a post-Ori, post Lucien Alliance galaxy, she still remembers the rules perfectly. Least of all, the contract, a verbal one is affirmation enough of course, basically meaning she brings the goods, usually some form of pilfered Ancient artifact, in exchange for the currency agreed upon, half going into her pocket and another to a savings account she procured years before Qetesh hijacked her body.

“I held up my end of the bargain, Konroy.” They’re in the backroom of a bar, hidden behind a cabinet full of half empty liquor bottles meant only as a ploy. Her gun is holstered, but her hands linger near her hips, ready to snatch it at any moment. “I romped through that noxious swamp and vomited enough for an entire year to retrieve this chalice for you. If the businessman in you wants to back out of the deal, the gentleman in you had better see it through to the end.”

He answers in a chuckle, his wide mouth pulling into a devious, high-cornered grin as his stark black eyebrows slant downwards, unmoved by her threats. He pours an incarnadine wine from a carafe into a mug. “Would you care for any?”

“No, I would care for my currency.” Crosses her arms the way she’s seen Cameron do hundreds of times before, when he does what he considers his intimidating stance, with wide set legs and a scowly face.

She’s not the muscle. Muscle was the muscle. She’s not the brains, or the brawn, or the multilingual polyglot. Only relies on three things to get her through these transactions: seduction, scheming and blind luck.

Konroy gulps back a mouthful of the wine, which is a lot because he has a rather large mouth, almost like a crater on the middle of his face. His black hair is greased back, and he looks like a gangster from one of the movies about the American mob that Cameron is so intent on making her watch. “The thing is Vala, we sort of sent you out there to die.” His lips smack together as he sets the mug back down on the large wood slatted table. “Didn’t really expect to have to pay you.”

Checks her watch and she’s late.

She’s late again and if she doesn’t get back home, he’s going to know. “While this is all exceedingly interesting, I don’t have the slightest care as to why you want me dead, or why you thought a swamp that smelled like wet excretions would stop me. I got you your chalice and I expect my payment.”

He chuckles again, swiveling to the front of the table and leaning back in against the edge. “The payment isn’t going to happen. But perhaps we can strike a deal.”

“And perhaps I’ll take my wares and be on my way.”

But it’s never that easy, never goes that easy and with a snap of his fingers, two bulky men squish through the doorway, their bodies strapped with muscles, their eyes almost hidden in the mask-like hard skin on their faces. Konroy raises his hand in gesture. “And perhaps again, you’ll reconsider my offer.”

Doesn’t need to hear his offer to know what it is and were she younger, and unattached, she would hear him out, spend the night with him, rob him blindly in the morning and be on her merry way. But she is beyond using her body to barter at the moment, being that it’s currently not just her body, and she’s already late for whatever fantastic dinner Cameron’s concocted.

She hopes it’s hamburgers.

In a fluid motion she twists and shoots behind her, taking out both henchmen in less than a blink of an eye. They topple over like the coniferous trees behind their home, the kind they use for firewood on nights only growing colder.

Gun still in hand, finger on the trigger, she aims back at Konroy, the smug expression wiped entirely from his face, now refilled with utter shock and a bit of fear.

Raises his hands, slowly spreading back across the table. “We can talk about—”

But her walkie goes off, and there’s only ever one person who calls her. The button pulsates green telling her to pick up and she groans, switching her gun to her less dominate, but equally lethal, hand and rips the walkie from her belt. Before she engages it, she turns back to Konroy. “You’d better keep quiet.”

He nods repeatedly, the extra skin on his neck rippling as he dares not move from the table. With a sigh and a repressed need to roll her eyes, she depresses the button with her thumb and brings the device to her mouth. Washes the threat, the coarse intimidation, from her face and lights up. “Hello Darling.”

“Vala, where are you? Dinner’s getting cold.”

“I just got a bit wrapped up.” It’s not a whole lie, but then why does she feel so bad about carrying on the charade. “I should be home soon.”

“How soon?”

“Within the hour.”

“The hour.” He sounds a bit upset as he sighs through the static. “Why would it take you an—Wait, please tell me you’re not freelancing.”

Konroy jerks to the left, testing her ability to multitask, and her finger presses down against the trigger landing a radiating blast in his right shoulder. Normally, she would be more prudent with the use of her gun, but the things she’s experienced in the last year have taught her to fire first and demand answers later. They’re untethered from the SGC, from their friends who probably continued on in their lives after their departure and now she doesn’t have to answer to any General, or any United States government department.

“You’re out on a goddamn contract.” Okay, so she has to answer to one man, and it’s not entirely answering in an act of subordination, more like collaborating and sharing information with.

Her expression falls from softened, to one of confusion as her lies weave into a bigger tapestry. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Even Konroy, who has his left hand smashed into his right shoulder to stem the bleeding, narrows his eyes at her poor ability to lie.

When she brought up the idea of them roaming the universe as free agents, he immediately refused her because they’d made enough enemies working for the SGC, they’d lived too dangerously through the SGC, and now was their time to retire and live in a modest two-bedroom farmhouse an hour from the nearest major city. He stays at home and farms and crafts with his large glasses and she couldn’t love him more.

But it’s boring, having no television, no internet. It’s boring and technophobic and all together backwards. The universe has expanded and evolved enough that she could simply hack accounts and transfer money to them, again an idea vetoed by him. 

Despite how adorable he looks in his farmer overalls and his straw hat, his fields are bare and don’t pay the bills. They don’t pay any fraction of any bill.

Konroy is starting to go white, and she rolls her eyes because honestly, if she had made this deal with a woman, she would have been home eating her second hamburger by now. With a grunt she reaches behind the bar at the side of the room, retrieving a white towel and tosses it to him to place over his wound as Cameron finishes up his verbal panic.

“I can’t believe you’re doing this. Again. Again after we just talked about—”

“Look, I’ve got to go Darling, but I love you and I’ll see you shortly.”

“Just—just get back here safe and soon.” Barely gets the words out before she disconnects, hooking the walkie back onto her belt and turning her attention back to Konroy.

Gun drawn, she points it at him again, this time aiming lower than his shoulder. “I’m missing an important family dinner and would greatly appreciate my currency now.”

He’s piled against the table leg and breathing very heavily. “The briefcase at the end of the bar.”

Keeps her eyes trained on him as she backs towards the bar and the briefcase which she spins towards her. Uses a fingernail to run along the seam and when it doesn’t snag on any unruly boobytraps, she cracks the case open, checking the money is present, and snaps it shut.

Without a sound, she steps to where she abandoned the artifact he requested, a bejeweled golden chalice which is more gaudy than anything and much to sparkly for her taste, but it does have the pretty though.

He only sneers at her while she tosses it into his lap. “I guess the rumors about you were true.”

“Oh, they all probably will be eventually.” Crouches before him the best she can, resting on the balls of her feet. Her stomach, growing more pronounced each day smooshes into her thighs and a bit against her chest. A sudden flush of heat washes over her, causes her mouth to dry. Swallows harshly and ignores the wavering before her eyes, her now unsteady footing. “What are they saying about me?”

“That you’ve gone—”

Vomits at the base of his shoes, vomits nearly as much as she did in the noxious gases of the swamp, the smell of hot garbage and bodily functions eroding her stomach lining. She heaves again spitting up nothing more than stomach acid.

“Ugh.” Konroy tosses his head to the side, his tongue hanging out a bit like an animal imprisoned in a hot vehicle. “Domestic. They’d said you’d gone domestic.”

Doesn’t understand the meaning of his words until she composes herself on two feet and uses the arm of her brown leather jacket to rub the remnants of vomit from her mouth. “I have not gone domestic,” argues with false offense.

She has gone a bit domestic and would rather sit on the sofa, cuddling with Cameron while he strokes her tummy, than be out on the town or out on a job. But she cannot go full domestic because every time she tries, they take it away from her.

Pointing a finger at the pile of vomit she’s left, she explains, “that’s from the swamp you sent me to.”

That’s not entirely true either because she's fairly certain that this child sides with Cameron on ruling whether or not she should go out on contracts. When she even attempts to leave the property, they flutter around inside her more, cause more nausea, dizziness, and of course nonstop vomiting.

Shakes her head clearing it of domestic thoughts and worries, instead allowing occupational concerns to filter through. Has to make it to the gate without getting attacked carrying a large portion of money.

“Enjoy your chalice.” Mumbles at the door, suddenly hungry and simultaneously full of energy, excited for the gauntlet of people between the bar and the gate who could possibly attack her. But she pauses in the doorway, and speaks to a now slightly unconscious Konroy, “also if you ever need another item pilfered, feel free to contact me.” Ducks out, then ducks back in adding, “if you’re willing to pay.”

* * *

Burgers. She wants burgers. Needs burgers. Bounces around the kitchen, a charming and petite afterthought added on to the living room, lifting lids and checking within pots. He has some sort of stew cooking probably to simmer overnight for dinner tomorrow. Doesn’t have any jobs lined up for tomorrow, instead taking it as a rest day, especially after dealing with the swamp.

The bathroom door creaks open and he exits in a sheath of mist with a towel draped around his shoulders. Does a double take when he notices her bounding around the kitchen, distracting him from dropping his laundry into the hamper, something he does regularly now thanks to her. “You made it back in one piece.” His hand blankets the side of her neck and his lips press into her temple. She closes her eyes reveling in the closeness, the calmness they share despite being marooned from everyone they care about. Trying to forget about the sacrifices they both made to be here.

He makes a noise in the back of his throat, disengaging from her. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but you smell like puke.”

“Yes.” Purses her lips, drifting back to the stove and the delicious smelling food, then to the fridge to search for ketchup. It’s not exactly ketchup but a tomato paste she’s been saturating in sugar trying to recreate the flavor. “I may have been sick a few times.”

“Define a few.”

She finished off the ketchup in the fridge this morning with the eggs Cameron tries to feed her in lieu of the sugar-coated cocoa wheat puffs she eats straight out of the box. “About half a dozen.”

“Dammit, Vala—” he’s gone from trailing her around the small idea of a kitchen, to chasing her as she pushes the dishes he used in the meal preparation off the counter and into the sink. “This has got to stop.”

Although she understands his attitude, his innate desire to keep her safe, how he boasts about her pre-stage waddle and about how her balance center has shifted, how involved with this child he is without having any connection to it but through her. She will not just sit in this farmhouse for the next twenty weeks and wait for this child to be born while hoping for no foul interruptions. “Everything cannot stop because I’m pregnant.”

“You were off active duty before we left Earth—”

Zips by him, solid like a statue with a cross expression and his hands on his hips. Next time she needs to remember to keep her chin up more when she imitates him. “Yes, and we left Earth because the SGC became a danger to us—”

“To you. It specifically became a danger to you and the baby.”

Stops rummaging through a cupboard that contains little more than a few gathered spices and some tea. “Is that why you’re upset? Do you miss Earth?”

She’ll gladly go back as long as it’s not under the vice of his military. Wouldn’t mind staying with his parents, or finding another country home, perhaps on another continent, definitely one with television and internet.

The harsh edges round out of his voice and he sighs, bungled hands relaxing flat against the wooden countertops. “I’m upset because you keep going out as a—” he chooses his words carefully “—free agent, and it’s dangerous.”

Reaches towards the highest shelf in the cupboard above the stove, her fingers grazing the jar of tomato preserves this child is driving her mad for. “We need a way to procure funds—”

“I thought you had tons of money stashed—”

“Yes, Darling.” Is growing tired, metaphorically over the same old argument they always have when she returns from being a free agent, and physically from hunger, from the strain of retrieving the chalice today. The memory of the swamp still sends her stomach into flips. “For emergencies.”

“Starting over is an emergency.”

“No.” Shakes her head marching away from him, desperately trying to keep the waddle out of her step as he frequently states how cute it is, and retrieves a chair from the small kitchen table, pushing it back to the stove. “One of us falling ill or being injured and needing immediate medical attention is an emergency. Being stranded in on a new planet with no food, or water, or shelter is an emergency. Once the baby comes and I’m unable to complete assignments as a free agent for a few weeks—”

“A few weeks, Vala are you gotta be kidding me.” Stomps away from her in frustration as she lines her rickety chair up with the stove.

Rolls her eyes, even though he can’t see her, and strains, shifting her knees onto the chair as it trembles beneath her. “I know it’s ugly, but it’s true. We need to procure funds now so that after—”

“And what am I supposed to do this whole time? Just be a trophy husban—Vala.” Turns back to her just as she begins to stand on the chair, and it wobbling precariously underneath her. His stride is stern but with intent as he scoops her up while she reaches for the preserves, then sets her on her feet away from the stove. With a hard, stable hand on each of her shoulders, he glares her down. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

And perhaps if he were any other man, she would feel threatened, but he is hers, as she is his, and she knows his anger stems from pent up frustration.

With innocent and wide eyes, she taps a finger gently to the cupboard. “The ketchup is on the top shelf.”

“Then ask me to get it for you.”

“I’m perfectly capable of—”

“No. You’re not.” Throws his hands up again as he turns to retreat from her, then, possibly remembering how she clambered up onto the chair the last time his eyes left her, he flips back towards her, his words mangled against his knuckles. “There’s certain things you shouldn’t be doing right now.”

“When I was in Ver Isca—”

“Honey, you’ve got to stop comparing.” Drops his balled hand from his face, the fingers unfurling and melting around her cheek. “I don’t need you to make bread, or stew, or cook, or act as a double agent for the Ori. I don’t want you to.”

“What do you want then?”

“I want you and the baby to be safe and healthy. I want you to be happy.”

“And?”

“And I want you to stop freelancing—at least for the next few months.” Bows his head to hers, and in his evacuated breath she draws hers in.

“I just want us to be prepared.”

“I know you do.” He sways her in a soft circle, hands falling to find her hips and missing them as they’ve begun their decent beneath her bump. Settles on rubbing her stomach and a grin blooms on his face. “But every time you leave, you take everyone with you.”

Allows a wry smile on her face at his sentiment. The emotions hit her harder in hunger, in fatigue, and if he didn’t bury his face against her neck, it’s very likely she would have cried. Instead she strokes a hand through his hair. “Oh, you’re that attached?”

“I’m that attached.” Words wet against her skin. The warmth of his body comforting, relaxing, and the disruption in her stomach from the swamp settles until only hunger is palpable.

Releases her hold on him enough so he can crane his head back. “Then plate up the food, Darling, because your child is hungry.”

“Right. Shit. Sorry.” All spoken as a single word and without a second thought he reaches upwards, easily handling the jar of preserves and setting it on the counter. “I made extras just in—”

She pushes the chair back towards the table, slotting it into place, failing to hear any of his words as an odd sensation falls over her. Instinctively, her hand falls to the dip of her stomach, and her nose crinkles, trying to understand the sensation.

“Honey?” Over her shoulder, he’s standing at the oven, thick chicken patterned mittens on his hands and a plate of his burgers stacked high on the counter. “You okay?”

“I feel odd.”

He slams the oven door shut. Fighting to get the restraints of the mittens off his hands. “How?”

“I don’t know how.”

“Like you’re going to faint? Like you’re going to puke? Like—”

Familiarity in the feeling, the humming, the bustling of prickles over her skin as if her entire body is being agitated. Felt it on the Ori vessel, but after giving birth, with Daniel, when—

“Cameron come quickly,” beckons him with open arms, that she might be able to sneak him aboard, as Daniel did once for her.  

He runs, but it’s fruitless, her skin already white and aglow and before his hands reach her, she shimmers out of their kitchen, yellow and bright in the early evening, and into the gray, bleak interior of an unknown ship.


	2. For the Show

“Vala!” He shouts for her even though he knows she’s long gone.

“No. No. No. No.” Allowed a grace period of a few seconds for whoever wrongfully beamed her out of her own goddamn house to put her back, then runs to the back closet. “No. No. No. No.”

Who would want her?

She’s five months pregnant, not exactly as lithe as she used to be, though he still has no complaints. She’s gorgeous and vibrant and when she’s not throwing more food than she’s ever put into her or falling into a coma-level of sleep where her snoring—because she’s congested, because this planet makes her congested—is so loud it rattles the inside of his ears, she’s exactly like her old self. Except she’s starting to look like she’s smuggling a basketball everywhere.

“Shit.” It’s probably someone she did a contract for coming for retaliation and the thought of how many ways—on how many levels—they can retaliate makes him nauseous.

They worked so hard to cover their asses. Enough gate jumps to make them both physically sick several times over. Hopped to a planet, vomited, and dialed out. Just that over twenty times until they finally got back to Thea without a breadcrumb trail.  

They stayed indoors for almost a week, brainstorming a game plan, talked about what they wanted to do and how they could do it. Through the calmness and cooing of ‘love yous’ and his hands brushing through her hair while she sighed heavily and happily against his chest, he told her he wanted to plant something.  Wanted to be rid of gates and ships and zats, wanted no technology at all despite Thea having an advancement level similar to Earth’s. Indoor plumbing is great, satellite tv not that much.

Just her and him and a bushel full of kids working the land.

Digs through the contents of the closet where he sets his rubber boots and hangs his coat, and she just tosses everything out and into the kitchen. She’s so messy and—God he loves her and if anything happens to her or their baby he’s gonna—“Fuck.”

Finds what he’s looking for, a gun like a shotgun, that he bought under the pretense of shooting things like coyotes away from the fields where he hasn’t even begun to grow crops, and the pitiful coop where he plans to get this planet’s version of poultry. He hasn’t worked himself up to it yet because he misses Earth and on times when he’s alone, he just thinks of gating back to see his folks and let them know he’s okay.

Really the gun is for protecting her, protecting his family, and when he brought it into the house—that she bought flat out and could stand to do several more times, so again, why the hell does she even need to be going on—she rolled her eyes at him and left the room.

Really has no fucking clue what he’s doing, his hands shaking as he inserts the cartridges, but going to the front lawn and shooting blindly up into the sky is the only attack he has.  

Stomps back across the kitchen, through the living room, tracking mud from the fields he was working in earlier—while she was out in some swamp puking her guts out for their only income—across the house and out onto the front porch. Listens for the angry creak of the stairs, but it’s drowned out by the sound of a cloaked ship.

Still draws the gun, tracing the sky for what he knows is there. Closes an eye, tracking through the sight, shallows his breathing, and watches the air ripple around the heat from the ship’s exhaust.

It’s not until the dust clouds into the air that he realizes the ship is landing, not speeding away into the atmosphere as he assumed it would. Keeping his aim, his gun ready, the overwhelming sound of an engine and the harsh landing give him somewhere to focus.

“Baby please tell me you knocked them on their asses and stole the ship back.”

There’s a hiss as the door disengages, and the immediate sound of her voice and he relaxes, lets out the breath he was holding in, and flicks the safety on, gun barrel facing down to the porch. When she appears from nothing, the ship still cloaked, her hand rubbing the top of her stomach, he full out drops the gun and takes off towards her.

Her combat boots clomp down the invisible, but obviously metallic stairs and she turns berating whoever else was in the ship.

“If you idiots ever try something like this again, if I don’t mangle you first, Cameron will—Darling, we’re fine—”

Tries to comfort him, but he doesn’t hear, just grabs her and holds her because it could have been Athena, this whole thing could have happened with Athena as the ringleader and what would he do? Doesn’t have the skill to get her back, the galactic knowhow. Can’t go back to SGC because they sort of burned all those bridges—or so he thought.

Behind her Jackson followed by another Jackson start to file out of the ship.

“You’re okay?”

“Yes.”

Pulls back, stares in her eyes for any of her tells, and replaces her hand with his atop her stomach. This time his voice is tenser. “You’re okay?”

Cold hand caresses his cheek and she grins at him, rubbing her nose off his. “We’re fine.”

She still smells like vomit, and he’s dizzy from the instant relief of having her back, the turmoil of how to get her replaced with the turmoil of how to protect her when she can just get beamed out of the goddamn house by any ship with Asgardian technology.

“I guess the next time—”

“—we’ll just land the ship—”

“—in your front yard—”

“—because that’ll go over well.”

Releases her and slams the first Jackson he can grab into the side of the still invisible ship, his hand all twisted up in his perfect black BDU shirt. “You just beam her up?”

“Mitchell.”

“Mitchell!”

“Cameron—”

“No Vala, we don’t know what kind of effects that technology can have on—” Finds his grip relaxing, and then tightens it, holding this Jackson still. The other stands idle on the stairs, floating above them, ascending again. “They know you’re pregnant.”

“We also knew—” The one under his hands grunts out.

The one ascending finishes, “—that it wouldn’t hurt her.”

“Or the baby?” Asks One who sort of gaks out a reply.

Then he turns to Two, who answers, “or the baby.”

Should probably let his hand drop at this point, let One go, but the rage, the uselessness he felt, is so much more than when he was left on base and she was out waltzing around the universe.

“Cameron.” Her voice is soft and floats from behind him, calming him, cooling him. She cups her hand around his shoulder tugging a bit. “Your child is famished.”

Her current way of suggesting he make her up a plate of food. Likes to make him guess what she wants and so far he’s actually doing pretty good at it, mostly because when they go into the city on weekend trips to stock up on groceries, he pays attention to what she buys and tries to cook what he can from them.

“Let’s get you a burger.”

“Just one?” Her eyebrows raise in surprise and she halts her walking to the kitchen.

Slides his arm around her waist, “as many as you want, Princess.”

“You know we actually came here for a reason.” Two thumps down the stairs, giving a quick glance back to One, who’s still trying to catch a bit of breath—which he thinks is a ploy for sympathy, he could have—should have—been a lot rougher.

“You mean your sole intention wasn’t to momentarily kidnap me to disrupt the lovely calm we’re trying to cultivate in our pleasant home?” Her words hit harder than he even could. He chuckles, proud and still partly out of relief, and hugs her side to him tighter as he feels the slight waddle of her walk.

“We came here to discuss—”

“Not now.” Throws his hand up into the air to stop any conversation they plan on having on his front lawn, as the sun sets, and the night bugs chirp up. But then he waves them towards the house. “Now is family dinner time.”

* * *

Vala packs away three and a half hamburgers, and almost polishes off the ketchup preserves they let stew for an entire day before jarring. He offers to do the cleaning up while she has a shower, but then the Jacksons clear their throats and it becomes clear that they weren’t just in the neighborhood to stop by for a barbeque.

Now, sitting beside her on the couch facing two Jacksons, each taking up a gaudy floral armchair she picked up at a second-hand store, he doesn’t know where the hell she shops, what second-hand store she goes to almost once a week, but all their furniture looks like it was taken from some French King in the sixteenth Century.

“Sam and O’Neill are on the _Odyssey_ now.” Daniel Two catches them up in the lives they left behind. “He’s the highest-ranking officer on board, but we all know who the crew answers to.”

He doesn’t have a tiny teacup for catching up parties, he doesn’t have that much of an interest to hear about how Earth is doing after the way things ended—he’d rather have a clean split—he doesn’t have the patience for their beating around the bush no matter how hard she’s shimmying from excitement beside him on the couch. Wants to think it’s because she finally got to use her tiny tea set, or because someone else has been allowed into their house, into their lives for the first time in six weeks, but he knows it’s because of the excitement from their old life bleeding back in, from her yearning to put back on the BDUs and hop through the gate again.

“Why are you here?”

“Cameron.” She slaps his arm with her hand, her mouth wide at his bad manners.

“No, it’s been like an hour and we still don’t know why the Wonder Twins are here.”

“What would your mother say.”

“Probably that we did a piss poor job of gate jumping if it only took them six weeks to find us.”

“Actually,” Daniel Two interjects, his tiny teacup a few inches before his face. “It only took us two days—"

“Why. Are. You. Here?”

Daniel One rolls his eyes as Daniel Two takes a sip of his tiny teacup, raising his eyes at Vala who simply shakes her head. One groans, “If it’s not obvious, we’re here because we need your help.”

“Uh-uh.” Stands from the couch, his knee jostling the refurbished garden cart she picked to use as their coffee table. There’s ornate little pink flowers and vines painted into the light gray wood and why does everything have to have flowers on it now. “I’m retired. I’m done risking—”

“Actually.” Daniel One interrupts, his teacup still full and probably cold by now.

There’s a clack as Daniel Two sets his teacup back onto the saucer and darts his eyes towards Vala. “We’re asking her.”

She’s caught off-guard, stretching her arms above her head mid-yawn. “Me?”

“Oh no. No.” The SGC doesn’t get to royally screw them, to try and separate them, to kick her off the damn planet, to do what they did and then crawl back asking for help. “Not interested.”

“Cameron, Darling, they’ve travelled all this way, wouldn’t it be at least prudent to hear them out?”

“We’re retired.”

“You’re retired, I still have a job.”

“Yeah,” his voice drops to a low growl as he leans in, “and you shouldn’t.”

She just yawns again as he sits beside her again—an overexciting day full of physical activity, and adrenaline pumping, followed by a full stomach, there’s usually three outcomes, sleeping, puking, or sex. With the Jacksons here, one of those is already off the table.

“We found more evidence of the Clava Thessara Infinitas.” One is leaning forward, like the information is top secret, like he didn’t spout those words once a day for almost four years.

“Well I’d hate to be the one to tell you this—” she tucks into his side with content closed eyes and nuzzles her face into his shoulder “—but I’m not your commanding officer anymore.”

“Oh, we’re well aware of that.”

“Things have never run smoother actually.”

“Great, then you might wanna hightail it before anyone follows you to what was supposed to be our very private address.”

“Vala gave it to us—”

“—and as much as she wants you to think she kicked our asses on that ship—”

“—she hugged us and cried.”

“All lies,” she mumbles and pulls away from him, cozying up to the opposite arm of the loveseat, her feet hanging awkwardly over the edge because of her heavy boots.

He grabs one of her feet and slowly unthreads the laces, pulling the tongue and loosening the first boot off. “She do the headlock one?”

“Several times.”

He chuckles and sets the first foot in his lap while he works on the laces of the second boot. “Look, where do we fall into this?”

“Long story short—”

“The information points us back to the Ancient ruins we researched four years ago.”

“There was a lot of ruins, guys.” Sets her boot down beside the other and holds her feet in his lap.

“The one where we got cloned.”

“The Xerox ruins,” she adds, her voice sounding far away, and her legs start to relax. “We can go.”

“You’ll have to excuse her, she’s had a long day of doing stupidly dangerous things.” He pauses waiting for her retort, and when she doesn’t offer one, he continues, “we’re not going.”

She sits up with half-lidded eyes and her hair all mussed from the fabric static. “It’s too late now. We can discuss this in the morning. I’m getting cleaned up and going to bed. Be a dear and help the Daniel’s get set up in the guest room.”

As she waddles away, she loses more balance when she’s sleepy, One checks his watch. “It’s 9:30.”

“Jackson,” groans as he collects the elaborate enameled teacups she brought out after dinner, because they don’t have guests—ever. “She’s making a person, let her do what she wants.”

Two says nothing, only sips his tea.

“Really Mitchell, how long are you two going to stay here?”  One abandons the remaining dishes on the garden cart, trailing him to the kitchen, bringing only a mildly irritated tone. “When you know you can go back to Earth.”

“Shhh.” His hush is harsh as his hands slam into the sink with the dirty dishes. One doesn’t look intimidated, instead just rolls his eyes. A quick glance back to the washroom tells him that she’s probably blissed out in the shower right now, curls of moisture wafting up from under the door. “Keep your damn voice down.”

“Oh my God, you didn’t even tell her, did you?” One’s jaw drops and Two scurries off the couch, bringing the dishes to join the conversation.

“Damn right I didn’t.” Shoves his hands far into the water, that’s too hot and prickling at his skin. When they breech the water again, they’re red.

“Why not?” Two slips the dishes into the sink.

“Because I’m not entirely sure this isn’t a huge trap to get us back there.”

“Teal’c is already back—”

“—next time we com in with great news, we’ll let him deliver it.”  

“Look, it’s not just that.” Finishes the last dish to the ornate little set she picked up while they were at a downtown market. Said she didn’t have any use for a tea set, but that it was still so pretty, and while she was having a bout of morning sickness in the public washrooms, he scooped up the set for her.

One grabs the towel he chucks across the counter to him and plucks up a saucer. “We already told you that Woolsey was transferred back to Atlantis three weeks after you left. Landry’s thinking about putting up a bulletin for you guys. When Sam found out what happened she—”

“Maybe I don’t want to go back to a planet that made us leave the way we had to in the first place.” He releases the water from the sink, wiping around the metallic edge and hanging the towel to dry over the faucet. “I don’t think that place is safe for her.”

“Is any? I mean—you both have your fair share of personal enemies, coupled in with the ones you inherited from the SGC—”

“I think what he’s trying to say—” and it’s a rare occurrence of Jackson death glaring himself “—is that there’s safety in numbers, and numbers back at the SGC.”

He strolls across the kitchen, hitting the lights, leaving only the table lamp in the living room on. He cracks the door to the spare bedroom, still not done up as a nursery, because as she put it so eloquently, there’s no cute wallpapers of teddy bears.

So he painted the walls a royal purple instead.

“The ruins are completely harmless.” Two revitalizes the conversation, sort of staring at the room which right now has the single bed it came with.

“If I got a dollar every time one of you told me that before a mission only to walkie me halfway through saying you had a problem.” He folds the closet doors back and drags out a cot, which was also left with the house. Vala really didn’t have a backstory on how she got it, or why it was for sale, and there’s a feeling in him that tells him not to ask.

“The ruins have a guardian—”

Reaching up in the closet for the spare set of sheets, he rolls his eyes. “And there it is.”

“Which the size of a big laptop—”

“—and happy to help us last time.”

“Good then it can help you this time.”

“We need her, Mitchell.”

“Oh no you don’t,” his chuckle is dry and there’s no humor in this for him at all. “We’re not part of the SGC, and since when do you need her? You’re both fluent in most dialects of—”

“Because of the guardian.”

“I don’t think I want to know.”

“The guardian likes her.”

“I said I didn’t want to know.”

“No, it likes her because she interacts with it—is kind to it.”

“Then try being nicer.” Tosses the final pillow from the closet shelf onto the bed and shuts the door behind him without saying another word.

He tidies the front room a bit, locking up the house for the night, brushes his teeth while doing so, which is usually a her thing, and it’s usually his thing to tell her it’s not cool to brush her teeth in the kitchen, but right now he can kind of see the purpose of it.

Finally, he cracks the bedroom door and the cool air from inside snakes around him, making him shiver. Tries to be as quiet as possible, but the house is still humid and the wooden door cracks and stretches when he shuts it.

Her arms fall over her head, the sheets clumping at her knees as she stretches her back out, releasing a fatigued groan. “Cameron?”

“Just me.”

She beckons him with a curl of her finger and a little wicked twist in her smile—it doesn’t take more than that. It never did. “I should hope so, or I’d assume one of the Daniels had a bad dream.”

Rushes to the bed, half-stuck in the shirt he’s trying to yank off. “If any Daniel ever crosses through that door in the middle of the night, I’m shooting to kill.”

“While your macho attitude is certainly stimulating—” she prolongs the word has his hand traces her thigh, following the curve of it inwards “—it’s unnecessary here. The Daniels are friends. They’re harmless.”

“Like a ruin guardian?” Shuffles into bed, her lips already grazing his neck. Flips to his side, then back, rolling her on top of him without warrant.

She shrieks, but his thumb traces her grin as she rolls her hips forward, over him, over his boxers which aren’t going to last long. His hand slides down, drops the strings of her nightie over her shoulders.

“Why is it?” Encourages his movements with a hand cupping at the back of his head, his lips working over her collarbone and dropping. She breathes deep with a tremor in her voice. “That you are so against going to these ruins?”

He tugs the nightie down so the silk fabric pools against her stomach, and while he nuzzles, while he licks and sucks, his thumbs race up her spine working over all the muscles knotted earlier in a smelly swamp. “Because there’s always an evil clone,” speaks against her so his words tickle and moisten her skin, “and I don’t want to find out which of them is the evil one.”

* * *

When he wakes up, she’s already gone, but that’s the usual now. She doesn’t sleep for very long anymore for any number of reasons. The difference is a little off putting where before, back on Earth, back with the SGC they would sometimes spend their entire day off in bed: order in, watch cartoons and documentaries, she might read a book while he wrote up mission reports on his laptop—she was usually the one who grew bored. Not bored—distracting.

Now she’s only good for four or five hours before her back starts to hurt, or she gets nauseous, or hungry. But he has a lingering feeling that she can’t sleep because she’s anxious, she’s scared that someone might find them here—someone not as benevolent as the Jacksons.

He’s told her to wake him, but she never does.

It’s a little after four in the morning, and through the wall he can hear two sets of snoring from the Jacksons that got a room for the night. It’s good to know that if the baby is in the other room, they’ll hear it cry, but he doesn’t think he’ll be letting their kid out of his sight for the first twenty or so years of their life.

He switches on the kettle for tea, he’s off coffee now, and although he had a massive headache for a week straight, he feels better about it, he doesn’t crash in the middle of the day anymore. The house is always eerie in the morning, especially since it’s starting to cool down, a mist rolls in over the fields that he still has no idea what to do with, because he doesn’t know if the dirt is acidic or basic, doesn’t know how fertile it is, or how the seasons on Thea work yet, and he hates it because he’s as useless as firing a shotgun off to the sky.

She’s right—they’re basically hemorrhaging money.

But not once has she told him to do something about it.

Yawns and tugs his sweater off the back of the bathroom door, slipping on his boots and unhinging the creaky back door. Knows exactly where she is because she’s at the same spot every morning—although he usually just watches her from the back window.

She’s only in her nightie, crouching at the top of the back-porch stairs with some of their table scraps set out on a little wooden floral tray. About five cats surround her, one in each color and when he steps out onto the porch with his cup of tea, she and cats get wide-eyed and freeze.

“Morning Honey.” Just walks out to the hanging swing, sitting down in it with a creak as six pairs of eyes trace his movements.

“This is the first time I’ve fed them, I swear.” A skinny black cat bops into her outstretched hand and she scratches its head.

“I can hear that thing purring from over here.”

In the pause the cat’s purr grows louder and it rubs against her knee in a tight spin. Her mouth skews to the side. “Her name is Josie, and she’s a good cat.”

 “It’s fine if they hang around,” he chuckles because he doesn’t care about the cats. “They’ll probably do a good job of mousing the fields.”

She scratches a tabby’s chin, while the others are busy munching away at poultry giblets, and pads barefoot towards him, her breath is almost a wisp in the air, hugging herself tightly. When she plops down beside him, he opens his sweater, stretching his arms out and letting her snuggle in beside him.

“I want to help the Daniels.”

“I know you do.”

“I’m going to help the Daniels.”

“It’s too damn early in the morning for this, Vala.” He can’t take another round of these debates. They’re not even debates anymore, more like scheduled PowerPoint presentations where she reiterates her opinion, and he restates his, and they both disagree and then just drop it.

Why did he have to like rural areas so much, why could he like islands. If they retired to live on an island she would never leave.

Bet she will always find a way to leave.

“You’re upset.” Not so much a question as it is a statement. She probably felt him tense up because she’s going again, back into the fray, and he hates it. Wants her to be happy, but just through different ways.

“We don’t owe them anything.”

“The Daniels were an integral part in our escape.”

“I meant the SGC.”

“Well, the SGC didn’t ask for my help, the Daniels did.”

“As far as I’m concerned, when we left Earth, we severed all ties.”

And he said something wrong because she’s shifting away from him. Out if his sweater, his arms, to the opposite side of the swing. Watches her, the way her jaw clicks into place, as she shakes her head at him.  “Its funny how you’re so involved with the past that you can’t focus on similarities in the present.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re so preoccupied with keeping me safe that you’re letting the big picture slip through your fingers.”

Man does he ever hate it when she starts talking cryptically, like there’s a master plan everyone else is in on—hell the baby might be in on it at this point—but no one bothered to fill him in. Sets his tea cup, just a plain porcelain one, on the ground and slides towards her, the swing rocking a bit. “So enlighten me.”

There’s another pause, filled with cats munching away to his left, and her focus disappears somewhere over the fields and into the hazy pinks and oranges of the morning. She rubs her stomach, he always wonders if it’s indigestion, or the baby kicking, or just a habit now. “We need to start thinking bigger, thinking of the future.”

“Okay, well, the big picture is in a few months we’re going to have a kid—”

“Oh I know, believe me I know.” Rolls her eyes at him, and then turns her attention away again, ignoring his advances, the underlying concern in his words. “If I were to forget it for even a moment, I’m sure you would be quick to remind me.”

“Look, I know you like adventure and being on the move. It’s just how you are, and I love every bit of it—” When he attempts to hug her close to him again, dropping his arm around her shoulders, he only gets a graze of her icy skin before she shrugs him off. Can’t even pretend it doesn’t hurt. “Honey, going out to dangerous ruins and—”  

“I’m still able to help—”

“I know you are, but you don’t have—”

“Then why was it so acceptable for me to be so self-sacrificing before?”

It wasn’t.

Every damn time she left through the gate, once, twice, sometimes three times a week, he would get scared as hell that something would happen. The sleepless nights, the waiting, the fear of her going out and not coming back and now when she leaves, she takes the whole family with her.

But if he told her any of this, she would say she knows, and the stalemate would continue. Knows her well enough to sidestep the answer.

“It’s who you are.”

“It’s who I have to be.”

“No.” The space between them on the swing is dangerous, just a chasm of disagreement. “Not anymore.”

“Being pregnant, having a child, does not justify not trying to help where it’s needed. To sacrifice what I can, especially for them.” Rubs at her stomach, but this time stares directly at him. “To keep them safe.”   

“And you’re just going to risk being discovered, by enemies, by Athena, hell by the SGC, for some carvings in the wall of a really old place.”

“Yes, because this is a very selfish act.” Her hand stills and whatever horrible things she’s thinking about creep over her face, the neutral expression washed away into one of regret, pure sorrow. “No one depends on this child being born. The Ori needed Adria—and—Qetesh—Qetesh—”

“This is our kid, Vala.” His hand flattens over hers, they rock a bit and he chances scooting closer. “I need this kid.” With a hopeful grin he adds, “I’m selfish as hell.”

Blinks and the first and only tear falls, her body loses the rigidity and her free hand rests on top of his. Wears a weak smile, one he knows is only ever for him. He loves it and he hates it because it usually means something bad is about to happen. “Then we need to help the Daniels.”

“Why?”

“If they’ve truly found evidence of the Clava Thessara Infinitas, then we need to find it before Athena does.” Tugs his hand to just below her navel and with a pinched face she stretches out her back. “Do you feel that?”

“No.” Strums his fingers, just waiting for the response from within, thinks he’s been waiting his whole life for it. Slides her back closer to him because she allows him to and he’s always grateful for that. He opens his sweater wide again and she buries herself back inside. “Would we be able to defund Athena?”

“Not fully, but it would be the first step.” Her cheek is cold against his neck and the words are almost automated from her mouth, just blank, like her expression. “We could use the capital to make mercenaries of her men or legally go after the Trust.”  

Shit.

Shit because she won.

“We can give them a day.”

“Cameron, she has the use of a sarcophagus, she has near unlimited funds, she will not stop until—”

“Honey—” taps her lower back so she scoots away. The cats watch him with an unwavering gaze and unmoving bodies as he stands, his thigh aching in the morning cold. “—One day is more than enough time to look at some symbols on a wall. We’re not going on a galactic crusade, or volunteering for any wars, or battles, or anything that can be remotely dangerous.”

Offers her his hand to help her stand, hauling her up from the squeaky swing. She grins at him and uses her thumb to wipe away some tea from the corner of his mouth. “But that sounds like such fun.”

“We’re going to be parents.” Holds her as the cats scurry down the stairs and back out into the limitless emptiness of the fields. The black one lingers, cleaning its paws. “We’re done having fun for the rest of our lives.”

“And yet you make it seem so appealing.” Grabs his hand again, positioning it at the side, stamping to her tightly. “Did you feel that one?”

“Nothing yet, Princess.”

She pouts, rewrapping her arms around his waist, resting her head back against his chest. “I just want you to share in it.”

He wants to too.

They don’t talk much about her pregnancy with Adria, because he wants this one to be different, to be supportive and magical and erase any lingering fears she has. “If it’s anything like you kicking me in tender areas while we sleep, I think I got the gist of it.”

Her mouth falls open in a mock of a gasp, in her theatric portrayal of shock, but before she can hand him a rebuttal, they both hear the morning grumbling of two pissy archaeologists who just found out there’s no coffee in the house.

The backdoor swings open, hitting the chipping paint on the siding and shudders back into place, as the Jacksons, in matching pajamas, toddle out onto the porch. Two rubs at his eyes and lets out a loud yawn, while One crosses his arms.

“You’re out of coffee.”

“Look at my boys.” Vala clasps her hands to the side, and maybe he didn’t realize how much she really missed the Jacksons. They are the closest thing to family she has, he was the first person to truly believe in her—since being a God to millions of worshippers—but she looks so proud. So purely content.

“You’re out of coffee,” Two adds with sleepier eyes—he obviously lost the rock, paper, scissors, for the cot.

The lack of caffeine slowing their reactions, she openly embraces them again in that deadly double headlock she’s perfected over the years.

 “My boys,” she cries against them, tightening her elbows and pulling them closers, taking turns nuzzling each of their cheeks like a momma cat.

“Vala.” One wiggles his hand between their bodies and uses his palm to try and pry her off, and a few years ago he’s be jealous, how she just openly embraces the Jacksons whenever given the chance, but it’s taken him this long to only begin to understand the relationship.  

“Oh my darlings, I’d forgotten you’d stayed the night.” They’re back in the chokehold and she’s preening them again.

“Vala!” One is done and manages to break free of her iron hold, stumbling backwards on the rickety porch.

Two holds on for longer, not that much, but Two always was a little more concerned for her, the one who accepted her caring a little more easily.

She releases him from her hug and rubs a hand over his cheek taping a bit. “I hate your beards.”

“You. Are. Out. Of. Coffee.” One presses his fingers into his temple, teeth gritting, eyes wincing shut at the sunrise.

“No coffee on this planet, Sunshine.” Bends and grabs the tray, still painted with the flowers she added. His thigh is beginning to ache, but he has an easier time bending now than she does, guess he’s playing catch up with her for the last four years. “But I could wrangle up some breakfast if you’re hungry.”

“Coffee.” One sort of pouts, while Vala reaches over, dusting cat hair from his shoulder.

The black cat watches him with curious eyes from the top porch step as he flings the leftover giblets into the field, then wipes his hand on his pants. “How about eggs?”  

“That sounds dreadful.” She tugs on the sleeve of the still mopey Jackson, and her bright grin makes him relax a bit. “Who wants sugary coated puffed cocoa crunches?”

“That sounds—”

“Really good actually—”

“I haven’t had sugary cereals since—”

“I was a kid.”

“No sugar cereal, Vala,” he groans because she gets a rush for about ninety minutes and then falls flat on her face for three or four hours. It’s not healthy. At this point he would just start to cook up hamburgers for breakfast if she would eat them. “You need—”

“Sugary coated puffed cocoa crunches.” She places a finger over his lips to silent him, and his gaze falls half-lidded at her antics. They have no access to a doctor, haven’t found one they trust enough—both of them would probably prefer to go back to Lam—and there’s no way of knowing if she’s getting all the vitamins she needs, from eight hamburgers a day and three boxes of cereal.

Two holds the door for her while One stops mid-step just behind her. “You know I think we brought coffee in the MREs.”

“Excellent Darling, go retrieve it and we can have a proper breakfast.”

“Hey, no coffee.” By the time he grabs his tea mug they’ve locked the back door, which doesn’t bother him that much because it’s about time for his morning jog, but for added emphasis he pounds a fist on the door and shouts, “No coffee.”


	3. To Get Ready

The ruins are just as they left them, a cavernous expanse running an entire mountainside in a ruddy color. There’s a small clearing, much like a quad or a compound burrowed out of the thick rock leaving flat terrain on which the gate stands. The ruins don’t get many visitors anymore, no longer popular as they were decades ago when the Goa’uld had an iron fist around much of the galaxy.

“Wow.” Cameron’s exclamation echoes as the dull, almost haunting wind howls through the area stirring up small tufts of dust. “This place looks like the Grand Canyon.”

“Actually.” Daniel One brushes by her, tossing his pack against a group of rocks, chiseled out and smoothed down as makeshift chairs, facing each other around a sooty firepit. “It looks more like Uluru.”

“Okay?” He gives her a scrunched face, like he knew this wasn’t going to be a good idea. They haven’t even made it inside, he hasn’t even met the guardian yet, which is where they’re more than likely going to see a bit of resistance.

“Uluru, also known as Ayers Rock, is a red sandstone formation in—”

Cameron groans, tossing his head back and stomping down the stairs cut from the stone, and would probably give her more of the same face if she bothered to look back at him. Instead she watches the tiny whirlwinds spin and break at her boots, hiding a coy grin because all her boys are back together.

“Look.” Cameron’s bag hits the ground blasting sand in all directions, he’s already favoring his bad thigh and perhaps it wasn’t the smartest idea to bring him along. It’s just—she’s missed going on adventures with him. They don’t talk about it because their conversations have become exceedingly fixated on one topic. Is she eating enough, is she eating the right thing, how is she feeling, does she have any cravings, should she be doing this, should she be doing that—the answer to both is no.

While being protected by such a caring man, one she chose to be her husband nonetheless, makes her feel loved and safe, it gets to the point where she’s not even allowed to leave the house alone, where he trails her all around the farm, and when she finally does break free in the black pre-dawn still shadowing the fields, she can’t fight the guilt that roils up within her because he simply just wants her to be safe.

If the discussion of adventuring did come up, before he blasted it straight down from the air with a shotgun, one he got under the guise of nipping mongrel animals from the back field, he would give her some sentimental answer about how every day with her is adventure enough. It’s adorable, it truly is, but the pleasantries of freshly baked cookies, and the domesticities of clean countertops and floors offer her next to no stimulation.

She misses going out into the field, misses exploring different planets, different cultures, hijacking ships and pulling aerial stunts, knicking a few goods on the side, but most of all, misses doing it with someone who shares her same penchant for adventure. Someone who has her back, not that he wouldn’t, he certainly does now, but he’s hating every second of this and they’ve only just arrived.

She misses being part of a team.

Part of a family.

She misses how it was before she exiled herself from a planet she grew to love, sacrificing friends for the safety of their child.

His warm hand falls to the flat of her back, inching her forward. “Let’s get in there so you can etch-a-sketch whichever ancient text you forgot to skim over last time and get the hell out of here.”

Daniel One groans, his pacing falls into step to keep up with the other Daniel now approaching the large monolithic entrance. There are bat like creatures stuck up in the craggy rocks and they watch with little red beady eyes.

Daniel Two sets down the pack near the reference point. Not a specific reference point like saying to meet by the water fountain in the middle of the food court—a food court and mall with amenities that she misses as dearly as an old confidant—but rather the reference point for calling on the guardian of the ruins.

Before anyone can object, mainly the other Daniel, this one stands on the calling pad, his biological signature being read and registered in an eerie, unnatural hum, like the machine may print him a receipt.

Despite the feeble wind, the next gust is coarse and prickles a bit at her bare arms. Cameron slides closer to her, hugging around her waist, pressing her brown jacket tighter to her, his hand settling on the curve of her side, just under the pack which he keeps trying to steal from her. Supposes it’s chivalrous, to have a husband who would do all the heavy lifting, and were this years ago, she would more than allow him to do so, but her pack contains little more than snacks and a water bottle, it’s not trying in any sense of the word, and his constant need to rid her of it is becoming patronizing.

“What’s that?”  He whispers, nodding to the platform on which Daniel Two stands.

“Remember when we went to that hotel and I kept dinging that delightful little bell at the reception desk until they took it away from me?” They stayed for a weekend for their second anniversary. Five stars, a jacuzzi in the room, chocolate covered everything, and she remembers being very satiated and in love in every way.

“Yeah.”

“This ruin’s equivalent of that.”

Before her answer results in many more questions, a rattling reverberates from within the mouth of the ruins, it sounds like tin cans tied to the back of a car—a joke he said they would have to make if they ever visited his parents again. She wants to, so badly does she yearn to return to Earth, but then her emotions have fled, bouncing around from gate to gate until finally settling in their farmhouse is still disorientating to her six weeks later.

Her arrest, her imprisonment, her interrogation that she’s never told Cameron about, all seem like mixed up dreams. What she does remember clearly is two stuttering polyglots opening her cell and tossing her the bag she keeps in her locker for emergency missions, telling her to run, and that they would have her back.

And if anyone bothered to ever ask her, that’s what she thinks family is.

Cameron angles his head away at the unpleasant sound. “What’s—”

“That’s Chippie.”

Bursting forth from the cavern, the ruin guardian appears. He’s half mechanical, half natural, a combination of intuition and innovation. The Ancients employed the device to keep the ruins running smoothly in their wake, only when they ascended, they forgot to mention it and the poor dear was running himself ragged until she and the single Daniel filled in the gaps.

While Chippie appears to be genderless, the mechanical voice he emits does have the tonal values of a male, when she asked if she may refer to him as such, he smiled and agreed. He’s created primarily from rock, the same rock the ruins are etched out of, but deeper down inside the caverns, so instead of being red, he’s more of a delightful brownish-gray. He’s about the size of a car windshield, and has a screen set on either side directly in the middle to portray his emotions in basic Tau’ri punctuation marks. There’s a rocket-like exhaust pipe sticking out from the bottom of him and puttering through the air seems to be his only form of transportation.

_:) —#Dr. Daniel Jackson#_

The little screen face is very pleased as small puffs of smoke boil out the silver pipe while he drifts to the other Daniel.

_:) —#And Dr. Daniel Jackson! How lovely it is to see you again#_

Cameron’s arm falls slack on her for once, and when she glances up to gauge his reaction, he’s wearing a very wry half-smile. “Okay, what the hell is—”

:O — _#Oh my! A new person! Who are you new person#_

Her husband’s face falters while Chippie buzzes around him, as if this is some marvelous joke. With narrowed eyes he glares at her and she shoos him a step forward, Chippie bouncing back a step to compensate the movement and Cameron clears his throat. “I’m Cameron Mitchell—”

“Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell.” Gathers her hands against his shoulder and rests her chin there. Still is anything but an expert in the hierarchical knowledge of the Tau’ri military, but the rank always sounds imposing.

_:D —#Vala Mal Doran#_

Chippie brushes by her husband, wavering to a stop before her with the biggest nonexistent smile she’s ever seen. “Hello Chippie, how have you been?”

_XD —# Oh very well. I’ve missed you#_

“Of course you’re friends with it,” Cameron laughs, not sarcastic but somehow pleased, like he was this morning when he discovered she had been feeding the stray cats for the last five weeks. Saw one on the way to the garbage bin to drop off scraps, and it was just skin and bones. How could she throw away a perfectly decent meal right in front of it?  A few days later another joined, then another. The little group follows her around when she needs to get away from being contained in that house. She paces through empty fields with dry and withered crops left over from the previous owners, and when she looks back, five cats cautiously stop walking. “Someone want to fill me in?”

_:O —#How rude of me! I’m the Computer Hardware Interface Providing Proper Intelligence and Education about the ruins which could otherwise potentially be very dangerous#_

While Daniel One, looking a bit perturbed at not getting any new information taps his foot, Daniel Two leans forward and helpfully informs, “Chippie for short.”

“Who named it?”

“Who do you think?”

When Cameron looks back at her she gives him a monstrous grin. He didn’t get the pleasure of meeting Chippie the first time around, when the sight of them threw him into a breathless frenzy, zipping to the side and eagerly asking questions. Throughout the planets, and now galaxies, she’s explored, she has never seen a machine so unfit for being a hermit.

_:) —#I also guard and protect the ruins! So I hope you’re not planning anything of malintent Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell, or I might have to kick your ass#_

“Cam’s just fine.” He’s keeping his guard up, but still wears that delightful smile. Chippie bobs around him, still happy as ever and eager to please. Around his third pass Cameron’s grin starts to fade, and her palms start to sweat. “Who taught it the swear?”

Daniel Two glances up from pulling a bottle of water from his pack. “Who do you think?”

As Cam takes another step, Chippie cuts him off, still passively content.

_:) —#Vala Mal Doran taught me that word! If you have any questions you can ask me directly! I’m here to help#_

The back of her neck starts to grow hot, possibly from standing in the middle of a clearing absorbing the sun with a leather jacket on. However, the lie to herself lasts meager seconds as the familiar queasiness sets in.

Daniel One almost swings his pack into Chippie as he switches shoulders. “We actually came back to take another look at the Ancient writing on Sublevel A”

_:) —#How interesting#_

“Yes.” Daniel Two agrees with sterner eyebrows than she’s used to seeing on him. Perhaps he’s just a bit befuddled by the entire mess, even she’s having a hard time following the conversation. “Can you take us there?”

_:) —#Of course#_

She cocks her head to the side at a sudden twinge in her temple, the nausea now rising in her stomach as the Daniels keep asking for entrance to the ruins. The morning sickness this time around is like none she’s experienced before. It knows no time, doesn’t stick to any routine, just randomly pops in until she’s vomited to the point of exhaustion and requires a nap.

“Hey.” Cameron steps to her, reaching out for her as saliva gathers her in mouth. “Are you okay?”

“Now Chippie!” Daniel One throws his hands towards the cave.

“I can see why they needed to bring—” extends his hand, cupping her cheek as a familiar tingle prickles at the back of her throat. Drops his hand just as quickly, recognizing the signs. “You’re on fire.”

She vomits, just as she did at the tavern yesterday, heaves her entire breakfast of sugary coated puffed cocoa crunches onto the dry terrain, half-digested, bitter tasting from the lack of sugar. Heaves again and the cup of tea and orange juice are not far behind. She’s bent at her knees, heaving a third time when nothing comes out, when tears gather in the corner of her eyes, and her nose starts to run from the stupid congestion she’s experiencing on Thea.

Then she realizes his hand is rubbing circles on her back, and he softly talks her down as if she has a weapon pointed at her own father again. That thought rings up another bout of nausea, but there’s nothing left in her stomach to remove. He helps her stand, his hands expertly scooting under her jacket, and as an extension, to her pack, grabbing both as they slid off her arms, then he tugs the holder from around her wrist and pulls her hair up, blowing on the back of her neck.

Sadly, this situation occurs roughly three to five times a day. Cameron handles it better than her, has a knack for knowing which words calm her, and what comforts she likes. He’s had plenty of practice, as from not being used to Tau’ri bacteria and illnesses, she tended to run sick quite more often then he did. Part of her always liked it, the way he cares for her, reminds her of being Qetesh—but in a good way. Having someone devoted to her who wants to be. Having a pure source of renewable love that’s meant only for her.

The Daniels stare in what she can only describe is horror, as they approach the firepit sitting stones with a very slow gait. His arm around her for support, but not too tightly as she needs to cool. Rubbing the back of her hand over her mouth to clear away any lingering bits, she sits on the closest stone while he kneels beside her, rummaging through her pack for the bottle of water.

Hands it to her without a word, just a sympathetic smile. Waits until she’s taken a few sips before questioning, “You good?”

“Yes,” almost unvoiced as she realizes she’s panting.

While her momentary hyperventilation continues, his palm touches the side of her face again, and he uses the cuff of his long-sleeved shirt popping out from beneath his jacket to wipe away the wetness on her skin. “You’re cooling down. Do you want to take a break?”

They just got here. Haven’t even been inside the ruins yet, but she’s exhausted, feels like she could curl up on one of the sun-warmed stones and have a nap like the black cat on their back-porch swing. Instead she just nods.

He nods back, picking up her jacket off the ground and dusting it off before setting it beside her in case she gets cold. He uses the rock for balance as he stands, his leg shaking with the lingering pain as he cups his hands over his mouth and announces, “we’re taking a break.”

“We just got here.” Daniel One shouts back, his arms flying in the air.

“We could always just—” Cameron whistles, jutting this thumb backwards to the gate. When she leans her head against the side of his good thigh, his hand drops to her hair, stroking as he continues his haggling with the Daniels.

“Fine.” Daniel Two probably nods, she can’t tell, her eyes are closed, but knows it’s him because his voice is softer. “We’ll pop ahead—”

“Vala Mal Doran?”

Opens her eyes when something blots out the warmth from the sunlight, to find Chippie floating level with her face, concern evident.

_:( —#Are you okay#_

“Fine, Chippie.” Holds her head up as Cameron shuffles to take a seat beside her. Her hand pets Chippie’s warm stone, and the bright green font of his face remains unchanged. “It’s just morning sickness.”

_:( —#It is no longer morning#_

“I don’t think the baby really cares.” Cameron bottles up her water, slipping back into her bag of sugary cereal and chips, that he groans at, but really, he should have never let her pack snacks for herself if he didn’t expect this. He doesn’t say anything though, more than content to sit beside her, his obviously aching thigh receiving heat therapy from the stone.

_:|— #Baby? What baby#_

She maneuvers his hand from the warm rock and guides it to where their child is adoringly punting her side. Pushes his wrist tighter to her and they both become silent, listening for a motion. When he says nothing, she raises her eyebrows at him expectantly. “Anything?”

“Nothing.” Each time he sounds more disappointed and perhaps it would be more prudent to stop asking until she’s further along, if only their child would stop constantly kicking her internals. Adria was hellbent on being the zealot of a religious empire, and she never kicked as a foetus once.

The Daniels, growing bored with idly standing around when they could be dissecting Ancient directions to a cache that she’s still not entirely sure exists, trudge up before them. Two looks a little pale, and One squints his eyes into to the sunbeam, throwing a hand over his eyes. “You okay?”

Cameron doesn’t answer for her, his hand still pressing intently trying to find kicking that’s since subsided.

“Fine,” answers for herself instead and as she thinks about standing, the barrage of kicks flies at her side again, causing her to hiss in another breath.

All three men, halt all their movements, going stiff like the porch cats, like they want to bolt, and she almost laughs, because she remembers Tomin and even the priors having the same reaction.

Shifts to her side to try and direct their child to pummel the other side of her body for a change. “Just a lot of kicking.”

_:0 —#Who is kicking#_

“The baby.” Pushes herself off the rock, feels Cameron’s hand guiding at the small of her back.

_:O —#What baby#_

“She’s pregnant.” Two offers, rolling his shoulder back, and marching back to the mouth of the cavern.

One, glances from Chippie back to her and, with an incredulous tone, questions, “you can’t tell?”

_: < —#I could Dr. Daniel Jackson. As you know I am programmed for medical diagnostics. But it is impolite to ask#_

They walk slowly, her boots dragging across the dirt, and for the first time she feels tired. Tired enough that she doesn’t want to be here and would rather be at home—would rather be on Earth where people she trusts can see to her being happy and healthy, but that wish is a little too farfetched now.

Although there are a few natural holes acting as lights, most of the ruins lays in darkness, with torches aligned on the walls illuminating very little of the caverns. The dust ground turns grittier as they stand in the mouth of the cave.

_:) —#How are you feeling#_

Chippie’s question echoes through the darkness but doesn’t upset the bat creatures by the snarling teeth of the entrance. They’ve probably grown accustomed to his exhaust and his voice.

“I’m doing well—”

Before she can add a ‘thank you’ to the end of her sentence, Cameron interrupts her. “Except for the backaches, the nausea—”

“Which is probably exacerbated by the types of food you choose to eat,” One chimes in, calibrating his data pad to the type of glyphs on this particular set of ruins.

“If you experts will excuse me, I was going to say—” As the baby kicks again she winces, the palm of her hand rubbing at her side “—except for the near constant kicking.”

“What does your doctor have to say about it?” Two looks up from his data pad, and both her and Cameron fall silent. He squints his eyes through the same thin-rimmed glasses she’s broke half a dozen times, and cautiously adds, “You…do have a doctor. Right?”

“We—” Cameron looks at her trying to find a way to explain that they don’t want anyone on Thea interested in their baby “—we’re having trouble finding one we trust.”

“Vala, you need to—”

“This is just idiotic, Mitchell—”

“—and a sonogram—”

“—are you going to live—”

“—and an ultrasound—”

“—just never trust anyone—”

“—and prenatal vitamins—”

“Just go see Lam already.”

Her head perks up at the last comment, because she’s heard the other ones from Cameron before.

She needs to have the scary blob picture done. They need to hear the baby’s heartbeat. Just ordinary Tau’ri things that lesser planets consider frivolous—although once he did leave his guide to babies on the arm of the couch while he was in the shower, and she did read up on the benefits of prenatal vitamins and over the course of several doctor’s appointments and post mission checkups, managed to accumulate roughly six months worth.

But that last comment—

“We can’t go see Lam—”

“Yes, you can.” Two interrupts, one hand removing his glasses and the other wiping across his face. “Is it really worth the health of—”

“Do. Not.” Cameron face falls hard, his molars crunching together and his jaw muscles tight. He’s taken a step forward, jabbing a finger at Two. “Tread. Lightly.”

Darts her eyes between Cameron, stiff and unmoving in the sand like he’s stepped on a mine, and Two who’s head is lowered. One has a grim look on his face, and she doesn’t understand the full implications of the conversation.

What was just suggested.

What was just divulged.

“What’s going on?”

_:) —#It seems as if Dr. Daniel Jackson and Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell are having a squabble#_

Chippie’s unhelpful whisper from beside her would usually warrant a grin and pat on her part, but the mood, the shift in dynamics is distracting. “I’ll ask one more time—”

“It’s nothing,” Cameron grunts, sliding her pack up his arm to sit with his. “We’re losing time.”

But the Daniels don’t move, Two’s head still hangs and One’s brow furrows in contemplation. “Cameron.”

“Vala—It’s nothing, you wanted to do this, let’s just—”

“Cameron.” As she takes a step forward, the barrage of kicks their child launches into another barrage of kicks. Without fully implicating their child in his means to answer, she simply rubs at her side with a bit of a pout. “You owe me an answer.”

But he says nothing and the longer the conversation continues, the more her heart sinks. Knew the protective overprotective line was very thin but didn’t think he’d cross entirely this soon.

“You’ve been allowed—”

“Jackson, I will haul your asses back to—”

“—on Earth—”

“Jackson!”

“—for almost a month now.”

Stares at One, trying to contemplate the information, discerning if it means what she thinks it means and if that’s so, trying to quell the hot pit of rage now brewing in her stomach. “Back on Earth?”

“The Alien Act was almost immediately revoked. Landry, O’Neill, Sam, they all put in pleas, spent three days explaining how you and Teal’c are beneficial members of the team.” One stands from zipping up his pack, tossing it over his shoulder, he again, almost hits Chippie.

Two resets his glasses and blows air out his mouth, hands resting on his thighs. “Teal’c’s been back for almost a month, when we found out we contacted Mitchell through—”

Her head snaps towards her husband, who glowers at the Daniels in the same way she glares at him. “You knew?”

“I—”

“He knew,” Two nods his head.

“We could have gone home to be with our friends, with your parents, and—” Her face scrunches, the emotions causing her to overreact, something she’s aware of but has no logical way of stopping. Feels her eyebrows dip, the tears burn in the corner of her eyes. “You didn’t tell me.”

“Vala.” Perhaps he realizes just how serious the situation is, because he takes a step towards her. They could have returned to SGC, and been happier, been less stressed. Had the internet and television, shopping malls and sports cars, taco Tuesdays and stat holidays. All her favorite things. “It’s not safe there.”

“No.” Tugs her arm away from him, and when her tears hit her hand, she realizes she’s started crying. “Apparently it is.”

“I don’t think—”

“That’s just it. You’re always doing the thinking for both of us.”

“I’m just trying to—”

“No, Cameron, you have no idea how I feel. How—” each day is a struggle because she loves him and he loves the baby, and she just wanted to give it a chance, but everyday she wakes up nauseous from anxiety, from knowing that Athena, and if not her, someone else, will track her down. Will hurt the life inside her that she’s given up so much to protect. “Dare you.”

“Vala.” Scrambles towards her like she’s going to stomp away, when she doesn’t have the strength to move just yet. He collects her hand in his, his palm sweaty, but cold.  “Just listen—”

Doesn’t tear her hand away, what he’s done will be forgivable, but she needs time. Needs separation.  “I’m done listening to you for the foreseeable future.”

Before he can answer, just as she turns away, fully waddling towards the Daniels in her emotionally drained state, Chippie sputters up.

_:) —#I’m ready to navigate you through the ruins now#_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed Chippie. He is my favorite and I love him. That is all.


	4. To Go

She won’t talk to him.

Flat out, won’t talk to him.

As that computer boulder thing floats around giving a brief history of the ruins, how they were set in place to copy Ancients, in order to do twice as much work at once. Apparently the Goa’uld adopted the technology when the Ancients ascended but there were defenses put in place to—is she really going to give him the silent treatment.

He ambles a little too close to her, and without even blinking an eye at him, she ducks behind a Jackson to be on the outside of the group, something he doesn’t like because what if one of these defenses is an Indiana Jones style booby trap that she sets off because she’s too busy holding a vendetta against him.

It’s not her fault.

She’s exhausted from nausea, from the extra weight of the baby, he drops back to cover the rear because she obviously isn’t going to be talking to him anytime soon—he’s really trying to think of what he did wrong here—which is nothing. Why would they go back to Earth? They were on such good terms before and look what happened. They worked for the actual government in planetary defense, but somehow the government still tried to screw them, and every time he thinks maybe he overreacted and that they should discuss the possibility of going back, he remembers when they arrested her—kidnapped her—from their house in the middle of the night.

A smile graces his face though because underneath the brown leather jacket that will no longer zip up, her hips sway in the most pronounced waddle he’s ever seen.

They stop at a fork in the ruins. Both hallways look equally dangerous with low light and tight walls. One, who leads the troop, uses one hand to position his flashlight and the other to check his data pad. “We need to split up.”

“We’re not splitting up” serves back almost immediately, and although he can’t see her face, he knows she just rolled her eyes.

Two turns over his shoulder, his teeth tight and his eyes narrowing a bit. “Well someone only gave us a day for three days of work.”

He chuckles at the attempt to dump the blame on him, because the Jacksons are wily, they know she’s pissed and if they can turn her against him they’ll have a majority vote in this crap shack democracy. “We’re not staying.”

“Then we need to split up.”

“Am I the only one here who’s ever seen a scary movie?” The flashlight swings around, dancing across the walls and even from inside the wind whistles through the rock. “Rule number one: don’t split up. I don’t want to be alone whenever the evil one of you two cracks.”

_:) —#If I might make a suggestion? Perhaps splitting into pairs would help you complete your task faster#_

“Makes sense.” One nods, his chin resting in the cup of his hand.

She still hasn’t said a word, and it’s been almost two hours of walking through ruins that all look the same, with the same stone and pretty much the same writing scrawled on the wall. This might be the longest streak of her not talking to him while conscious.

“All right.” One turns the flashlight on her, and she isn’t as carefree as she was before, as happy and bubbling with a skipping step and sweet smile. Instead she looks tired—he knows she is, she’s been going nonstop for the last few days, taking up contracts as a free agent, and barely getting any sleep—sunken eyes and dry lips—and if he knew she wouldn’t disagree with him as a form of protest, he would use his thigh as an excuse and demand they leave and go home. “You two head into that room, and Vala and I will take the—”

“No. No. No—”

The rest of the group—including her—groan around him and his constant need to remind them that under no circumstance is he leaving her.

“Mitchell—”

“No. Nope. Deal breaker we’re—”

But she’s already walking down the opposite hallway—well, waddling down it—with the computer rock puttering behind her, saying something she nods to.

“Vala—”

Goes to tear after her, but One stops him with a hand to his shoulder. “The Goa’uld addendums are down that hallway, so she needs to—”

“Then I’m—”

“—There’s also important information, what we think are instructions to using the key for the clava thessara ininitas, but—”

“Then let’s—”

“— _But_ it’s in Ancient, so one of us has to go with her—”

“Then all of us can—”

“Look.” Two’s hand clasps down on his shoulder and he already doesn’t like where this is going. “If everything goes according to plan, we can all be out of here in just under three hours, and you can go back to lying to Vala without our interruption.”

“When was the last time anything ever went according to plan?” Has to ignore the last jab because he’s very close to desecrating ancient ruins by kicking some Jackson ass. Ignores it for her, because fist fighting her best friends after leading her on a bit isn’t going to make him look any better.

“Not now because you’re driving us off topic and wasting time.” One’s feet crunch over the gravelly floors, as he pivots and follows the same hallway she did.

“Let me ask you this—” Hikes both the bag straps back up his shoulders and—both bags, he still has her pack of sugary snacks. Should probably go take it to her but doesn’t like the idea of her being more bogged down. Maybe if she gets hungry, she’ll actually seek him out. “How do you expect me to be useful? I don’t read Ancient, or Goa’uld, I’ve got a bum thigh that’s already acting up—”

Flipping his flashlight to the relatively cobweb free hall, Two begins the trek to the second room. He follows, eyes scanning the walls for anything out of place for what he knows of the ruins so far.

“You can just hold the flashlight or something.”

*

It used to be so simple.

So, so simple.

It was just her and him, and their happy little accident, and a whack of back porch cats. They didn’t have much, but they had fake ketchup and awful sugar puffed cereal which was enough to satiate her current cravings, but then the Jacksons—those wily bastards—had to creep their way back, find them twenty gate jumps away because she left a forwarding address for them and he loves her—God, he has to, to put up with this shit—but her nonchalance with her safety is going to give him a heart attack, and if he has to look at the same stupid Ancient block letters for another hour, he’s going to have an aneurysm.

“Hold it straighter.” Two pushes at the bulb of the flashlight with his palm, doesn’t drag his eyes away from the same slab of rock he’s been translating before he got all worked up again—she went one way and he went another and right now she could be with the evil Jackson clone and he wouldn’t know.

Just snorts and pops his wrist when he holds his arm up straight again, going back to daydreaming nightmares of her fighting off evil clones, and ruin cave-ins, and that weird computer guy blasting around and—

“She’s being weird because you’re restraining her.”

Again, Two doesn’t looking away from the glyphs, instead tracing one onto his data pad and then lifting it to snap a picture. Then feels around on the floor for his little mat of set up archaeology tools, retrieving a little brush that he swipes over the letter.

“Excuse me?” Loses his balance, crouching on the balls of his feet. The light waivers.

“Vala is wild—” stops mid-sentence pointing to another area of the wall, shuffling over on his feet, his body—without the aching thigh—never leaving the crouch as he demands, “light.”

“Oh, I know.” Might shoot the flashlight closer to Two’s face then he originally intended, but what he doesn’t need now, or ever really, is a lesson in Vala. She’s his wife, although they haven’t really taken to using the moniker that much aloud, it’s how he thinks of her in his head. His wife, his love, the mother of his kid if they make it that far because right now she’s probably contracting space rabies from all the bats lining the roof. “And I’m not restraining her, I’m protecting them.”

“Them?” Two snaps another picture, leaning close to the wall, and sliding his index finger along the indented glyph.

“Her and the baby.”

“That’s another problem.”

“You’re telling me.”

“No, Mitchell,” Two huffs, then sets down his data pad beside all his other little tools, turning to him. “Vala, she’s never stagnant, she doesn’t settle.”

Whatever this conversation is, he doesn’t want to have it, sure as hell doesn’t want to be having it while crouched in some dusty, smelly ruins. “People change. She’s—”

“She may act content but—”

“She was with the SGC for almost 8 years before—”

“Yeah, and at the SGC she got to leave the planet about two or three times a week.”

“Yeah, and she always came back to me.” Not going to debate the validity of their relationship, of his untainted adoration for her, and how she makes him feel like no one else could ever. “She always came back.”

“You’re telling me there wasn’t one time, just once, where she didn’t come back unwillingly?”

Remembers lying on a bed in an inn on that planet where he took a zat for her, where she loped across a field like a wild jackrabbit from two snarling dogs and two angry guards, and how she tried to leave him, tried to back burner their relationship and how he refused.

When he doesn’t answer, Two drops his brush and shakes his head, huffing, “Mitchell, she’s pregnant.”

“Again, well aware of that, Sunshine.”

Two points back to the wall, shifting again, dragging his little cloth pack of tools with him. “That literally anchors her into place. It’s a lifelong connection to you. For someone who doesn’t like to be tied down—”

He drops the light again. “She’s my wife.”

“Fine,” Two sighs, and taps his hand, nodding to the wall where to aim the light.

He aims it and tries to distract himself by thinking of all the reasons he shouldn’t smash the flashlight into the back of Two’s head.

“Let’s say she’s changed. She’s completely content spending the rest of her life with you out in that shack without basic human amenities—”

“Jackson, you’d better have a point because I’m not in the mood to—”

“You’re too overprotective.”

“Well, she does a lot of stupid shit.” Drops the light again, and this time let’s his feet roll back until he’s sits in the weak layer of sand still remaining after Two cleared most away.

“You weren’t this overprotective before—”

“Yeah. I was. I just couldn’t show it because of work.”

“Fine, you weren’t outwardly this overprotective before.” Two grabs the flashlight now and clamps it beneath his chin so he can dust and touch and also see.

“So?”

“So?” The flashlight falls from the bob of his chin and rolls a little in the scattered sand. “So, she thinks you only care about the baby.”

“Yeah, okay,” he groans as he tries to construct himself on his feet, but the muscle in his thigh pulls tight and he ends up smashing his ass off the solid rock floor.

“Think about it. When was the last time you asked her something without the baby in mind?”

“I ask her stuff all the—”

But he doesn’t.

Not really.

All his questions, if she ate, what she ate, if she slept, for how long, if she’s tired, if she feels sick, all relate back to the baby, and his concern stemming for them. Hasn’t asked her what contracts she’s pulled recently, or what he should grow in the fields, or if she enjoys living where they are, or why she wants to go back to Earth so bad.

Two seems to understand the definition of his silence and nods, snapping the flashlight back to his belt and then crunching his boots over the ground as he stands. “You don’t have to worry so much, Mitchell—”

He’s not going to bother to argue with him on how Vala feels or why she reacts the way that she does—only she can give a truthful answer—although, his points are valid—but there’s no way he can’t worry about her. How many times has he almost seen her die? From torture, from lack of oxygen, from a gun pressed to her temple, from pollen, and arrows, and the garburator. How many times was he forced to watch her die in that looping day? It keeps him up at night, her leg heaped across his chest and his palm kneading into the small of her back while she’s sound asleep, he holds her, bunches her hair, feels the softness of her skin against his, the steadiness of her breathing and listens to her snore until he can relax.

“After everything that’s happened to her, yes I do.”

“She’s still self-sufficient.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Hears something echoing down the hallway, not so much like boots clomping, or her boots clomping, but almost hissing, like steam.

“It means that she can take care of herself.”

“Yeah, well, maybe for the next few months she should let me help a bit.”

Places the sound only a few seconds before the robot rock thing zips, wobbling in the air from speed, into the room, interrupting their debate about his wife by saying nothing but his name on repeat.

_:O —#Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell! Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell#_

“Yeah, I’m here.” Dusts off the shins of his pants after the exhaust port from the robot thing stirs up the dirt on the ground.

_:O —#You must follow me quickly. There has been a disaster#_

“Disaster?” Two says the word like he doesn’t know the full meaning of it, and he probably hasn’t since he’s never been on the receiving end of a call that begins ‘we have a problem’.

“Is Vala okay?”

The ruin guardian doesn’t answer him, instead zips off back into the hallway at such a speed that he only grabs the packets before leaving Two in his literal dust, bounding down the hallway, ignoring the pain burning in his lungs. “Hey Rockbot.”

_:\ —#Vala Mal Doran is in distress. She requested your immediate—#_

“What happened?” Almost out of breath but boosts up his feet, thankful that he still does his early morning jogs. Doesn’t stop until he almost rams into the robot’s back face as it blocks the doorway. When he squirms around it, he finds a room similar to the one he and Two were in, but empty. “Where is she?”

_: <—#In the lower catacombs#_

“Where is that?” His hands clasp down on the side of solid rock and he glares at a low-resolution screen of a face, his huffing breaths causing fog over the domed exterior. “Is she okay?”

_:( —#For now yes#_

“For now?” Pants as Two falls into place behind him halting himself with several slapping steps.

_:( —#Her blood pressure and temperature are up, and she is leaking saline from her eyes#_

“She’s crying?”

“What happened?” Two shuffles into he room exploring the writing quickly, his finger still dragging over the indented glyphs.

He doesn’t want to tell them that he didn’t need a crystal ball to predict this disaster, and before his hands turn to knuckles and he starts beating an archaeologist with a rockbot, he focuses on Vala, somewhere below them—all questions but how to get to her can wait.

_:( —#I did not want to leave her Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell, but she pleaded with me to find you and bring you to her#_

“Then let’s go.” Releases the floating bolder and steps into the room.

_:( —#It is not that easy. In order to reach the lower catacombs, you need to be cloned#_

That garners Two’s attention and he stands from crouching, almost halfway through reading the room. “Come again?”

_:( —#The lower catacombs are where all those cloned are stored in stasis#_

“So Vala’s in stasis?”

_:( —#No. Dr. Daniel Jackson set off the cloning reaction within the temple walls. I was able to redirect her down a different chute during the process. However, Dr. Daniel Jackson was cloned again, and being a clone, his cells immediately started breaking down—#_

“Wait, so that Daniel was the fake.” Two stands straighter, a look of shock wiping itself clean from his face and quickly being replaced with a tight, smug grin. “I knew—”

“Focus, Sunshine.”

“Right. Right. We should—”

_:\ —#Actually Dr. Daniel Jackson, you cannot travel to the lower catacombs as you are also a clone, you’ll decompose as well#_

“What?”

“What?”

“Neither of us were the original?”

_:| —#As aforementioned, the originals are stored in the lower catacombs. I was able to redirect Vala Mal Doran from being processed, saving her life in the interim, however in order to be reunited with her, Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell, you will need to be—”_

 “Do it.”

 


	5. On the Wagon

She thinks he’s dead.

Was fiddling around with the indentations on the ruin wall and tripped something up, a classic Daniel  mistake, causing a bright white flash to encompass him first. As she turned, angling her head and calling out to him, something shoved into her, directing her to one side, away from the light.

When she opened her eyes, when they were clear of blurs and spots, she was in a different level of the ruins in what looks to be a labyrinth. There’s very little light, only torches stuck burning lowly along the walls kept aflame by someone or something.

But in the backlit glow, she identifies Daniel laying face down on the stone-cobbled floor. His glasses toppled a few inches from his face and his body showing no signs of life.

She has bruises from the fall, or rather the transfer, could have been beamed down here for all she knows, and other than her now constant state of nausea, she’s never been better.

“Daniel?” Harshly whispers at his unconscious form. There’s a bit of blood running from his ears and when she instinctively reaches to check her own, she finds a few drops dabbing her lobes.

Should be more worried about herself, would be if the baby wasn’t so intent on still beating her innards raw. But despite her best efforts to remain nonchalant, fear tinges her voice this time around. “Daniel?”

Crawls towards him, covering the ten-foot gap with her bruised knees burning over hard stones, and one hand on her belly to protect the little one from dragging. She’s panting by the time she reaches him, collects his glasses in her hand and watches for the rise and fall of his back, of his chest beneath his body’s weight.

“Daniel?” Overly panicked, vision blurring from tears and the lingering otherworldly flash, her palm flies to shove at his back, to flip him so his face isn’t buried against the ground which is entirely the wrong thing to do.

His body—his body becomes malleable under her touch, wet and soft like rotten fruit. The sound, the smell of innards escaping brittle skin is nightmarish, blood and bones and organs turned into a slurry and she crawls two steps back before vomiting from shock, from response, from morning sickness, it doesn’t matter anymore because there’s nothing else in her stomach to bring up, just a bit of water from earlier.

The stench of stomach acid mingles with dust in stone, the bitter smell and Daniel’s rotting do not mix, only making her gag harder. She tries to stand but slips against smooth stones until she clambers into a corner, almost out of view, panting before hysterically wailing.

Her Daniel.

One of her precious Daniels and there are two, but she knew this one as she knows both, as she knew him when he was of a single mind and body. She’s had tea with him, fetched him coffee, bought him birthday cards, and Christmas presents, and received get well cards from him when she fell ill. She knew how separate they were, how One was more logical, more likely to get isolated in his work and less personable, which is why he needed more attention. She pulled him first into the headlock hug on the ship, after he assured her there would be no harm to her or the baby, and he nudged his cheek against hers. She teared up, because One, who was more studious and into facts, not friends, had missed her as well.

_:O —#Vala Mal Doran did the fall harm you#_

Hears Chippie’s exhaust, feels the change in the air current, the short gusts of warmth as he bobs before her.

It’s hard to talk, to breathe, to form sentences and when her hands come up to hide her face, there’s a bit of Daniel’s viscera stuck beneath her nails and dried between her fingers. Whips her wrist madly before rubbing it off on the floor, and then her pants, and then crying again.

This was him.

_:( —#I wish to run a medical scan to search for your injuries#_

An ultraviolet light encapsulates her, flickering briefly over her before she hears an unusual whirring from him.

_: < —#While your blood pressure and heart rate are accelerated I cannot find any evidence of injury#_

Touches him, his bouldered side, because she needs grounding and if it’s a ruin guardian who needs to do it now, so be it. “What—what hap—”

_:C —#Unfortunately Dr. Daniel Jackson’s clone initiated the cloning process. Clones cannot be cloned as it results in cellular deconstruction which—”_

Looking over at Daniel who is little more than a wet mass puddling out from beneath clothes, she doesn’t require further information.

_:I —#It might please you to know that your fetus is uninjured and medically healthy#_

Takes a breath watching the leftovers of her best friend creep further across the floor, falling into the spaces between stones and coursing forward in little rivulets.  

“Yes.” She’s not here, not right now, and her body is going numb, the trembling stopping, the comprehension oozing away. “Yes.”

_:) —#Would you like to know the gender#_

“Not—” She slaps his boulder a few times, the sensation awkward, unknown under her fingers and she leans back into the wall, suddenly tired, still shedding tears. Still leaking just as Daniel is. “Not right now.”

_:| —#Vala Mal Doran forgive me but I think you are unwell#_

“I—I am.”

_:C —#I do not understand. The medical scans indicated you are#_

“Chippie,” sniffles, her face drenched, eyes burning and one of her hands still clutching Daniel’s glasses against her stomach. “I need you to go get Cameron.”

_:( —#You wish for me to bring Lieutenant Colonel Cameron Mitchell to you#_

Rubs at the baby kicking in anger now at the influx of her emotions, of having to siphon through her unadulterated shock and dread. “Yes.”

_:C —#It’s impossible to bring him to the lower catacombs he will need to be—#_

“Chippie, please bring me my husband.”

*

She’s only capable of waiting around the corner for a few minutes because she knows what’s over her shoulder and despite not looking directly at where Daniel was, her imagination is pulling threads and knitting a horrible tapestry of grotesque images her mind immediately comprehends in a void left by the wake of Qetesh.

Hands flat against the walls, she’s able to rise, sweaty and uneven in combat boots strangling her swelling feet as she embraces the fatigued waddle propelling her further down the corridor, away from his remains, finding more than a dozen doorways.

Ducking in the first room, she finds what looks like an empty pod, something that looks like it’s used for suspended animation. There is not much light in the room, only filtering through from the torches in the corridor, and nothing of interest except the contraption that she doesn’t immediately see the significance of.

She finds the same thing in the next room.

And the next.

And the next.

Until ducking into the fifth room, her legs starting to ache and her back growing very sweaty in the stagnant air below ground level, she finds the same thing, but occupied.

And she stares.

Then squints, angling her head to the side, because it is, but it can’t be.

But it is.

Daniel.

Glasses removed; a neutral expression quite literally frozen onto his face. Another copy, perhaps kept for an archive and just how many of them did this temple need?

But this one—there’s something unique about his face, how even frozen in this manner, he still looks perturbed, and whether it’s the sudden shock, or the surge of hormones that wants her to curl into a foetal position on the floor and cry until she’s transported out of these horrid ruins, she’s unsure, but her hand reaches forward touching the outside of the stasis pod, her fingertips slipping over a face that scowled at her so often she could sketch it from memory.

The pod isn’t cold to the touch, but he’s not exactly frozen, in fact the pod would need to keep him at body temperature in order to maintain his life. As her fingertips lick over the warm glass, one of the screens to her right beeps to life, showing archaic markups written in Ancient. With her basic fluency level, she discerns that they’re translating his body rhythms, heartbeat, brainwaves, urine output and as she angles her head int eh opposite direction, trying to decipher the importance, a more distressing klaxon goes off, a red light flashes, and the pod tips forward, knocking her back.

As she stumbles, the bottom breaks off the pod and all the liquid rushes out the bottom down a well placed drain before Daniel, nude in every aspect, slides out, his feet hitting the ground as he groans in half syllables, but due to his lack of a full consciousness, he falls to his knees before falling forward onto his face with a grunt.

The remaining liquid drips over his feet and she compresses into the corner. Daniel coughs up some of the pinkish liquid that rolls backwards down the gentle slope of the floor and to the drain. His hands worm underneath his torso, pressing him upwards to sit up. He runs a hand through his hair clearing it of more cotton candy colored droplets.

“Ugh.” His hand runs greasy over his wet face and his eyes squint at her as he coughs another mouthful of the liquid up. “Who’s there?”

She doesn’t answer, still under the assumption that he’s not one of her Daniels, and she wraps her jacket around herself tighter to try and hide her bump. 

His glasses, much like his clothing, didn’t make it through the preservation process and he’s still having a difficult time pinning her down. He snorts, rubbing his forearm across his nose, “whoever is there, I could really use a towel here.”

She doesn’t have a towel, she doesn’t even have her bag which is just snacks and nothing of value because this was supposed to be a fun excursion with her boys, with the two Daniels, and her wonderful—albeit overbearing—husband whom she adores. It wasn’t supposed to lead to a fight that’s been brewing between the two of them for the last six weeks, or to one of the Daniels liquefying at her touch.

Cameron was right, they never should have come, the never should have—

“Vala.” He’s standing now, his eyes squinting, his voice tense with concern. “Are you okay?”

Then she realizes she’s crying, sobbing quite loudly, and this baby is already reeking havoc on her internals, they should be kind enough to leave her emotions alone.

“I’m here, Darling.”

His voice settles and his muscles relax as he continues to scan the room for her. “What happened?”

“Well, that would depend on what you remember last.”

“I went through a crack in the wall.”

“One I told you not to?”

“Yes—” Hears the grating teeth in his response. “—then there was a bright flash and—”

Then it all makes perfect sense.

He’s not a copy kept for archiving purposes, but rather the original stored away. Chippie mentioned upon their first trip here that the main reason for cloning was to duplicate the amount of work an Ancient could do. Had always just assumed that fifty percent of the duplication would be the original, but it seems as if the original is stored away, perhaps until the clones are no longer of use or deceased.

But Two was still alive when she left him with Cameron. If Two is dead she’s lost another friend, and her husband may very well be—

“Vala, you have to do something other than cry.”

“He’s dead.” She’s surprised by the own lack of emotion in her voice, perhaps she’s used up her reserves.

“Who’s dead.”

“The other you for sure.”

“What other me?” He’s ambling towards her, hands out before him, legs straight, knees stiff, and perhaps not entirely aware of his level of nudity.

“You were cloned, Daniel.”

“When?”

Shrugs off her jacket, finding her skin growing very hot, the room and her chest feeling tight, her head empty and floating. “When you walked into that crack. It made two clones of you and stored you away.”

“How—how much time did we lose?” When she taps her hand, the one balling up her jacket to his outstretched arm, he bucks back, but then reaches forward, his slimy fingers scrolling down hers. “What’s this?”

“My jacket, you might want to rap it around you waist. You’re quite nude.” Wrenches the jacket from her hands, tying the arms around his hips, his hands weaving rapidly. “Oh, a pair of your glasses are in the top front pocket.”

He smirks at her, reaching for One’s glasses, plucked off the ground before—before—Slamming them onto his face and his eyes fully blossom open. “How much time, Vala?”

“Oh.” Rubs at the top of her stomach, the baby finally settling, feeling like a drifting leaf within her, delicate and gentle and they never should have come. Why did he let her come? “About four years.”

“Four _years_?” Almost screams the word, his mouth falling open, and his fingers snatching the fumbling jacket back to his hips.

“And change.”

“I’m sorry if I seem a little unappreciative, but why the hell did it take you four years to find me?” He’s pacing in the small room, about the size of the curtained off medical areas in Dr. Lam’s medical bay. His legs are wobbly, and he’s waddling much like her.

“You produced two clones.” While the kicking has subsided, her nausea has not. A new wave of dizziness spreads through her as she grabs at her stomach and banks into the wall for stability. “We didn’t—we thought one was you.”

He stops his pacing, bunching her jacket with one hand and the other pointing at her. “Holy crap.”

“What?” Drops her head down, trying to see what he can, what she can’t. Worried there will be pieces of One left over on her.

“You’re pregnant.”

Rolls her eyes because now there’s another man to just constantly remind her of it. “Obviously.”

“How did that happen?”

“Honestly, Daniel, you’ve always boasted about your superior education.”

“You didn’t get sucked through another supergate, did you?” His stance is still uncomfortable as he lowers himself, and her jacket, to a stone either used for decoration or display. Wishes she had claimed the seat first.

“Not this time.”

Then the color, the blood, drains from his face. “It’s not mine is it?”

“How could they be yours; you’ve been in stasis for four years.”

“Stranger things have happened.”

He quiets and in the looming silence she is privy to her own heartbeat in her ears. Cameron was so right about this, of the dangers waiting for them all because she can never be fully domestic, can never embrace the roles that come naturally, the ones that frighten her the most.

“Wait a minute, it’s not one of my clones’ is it?”

“No.” Shakes her head, hand rubbing like she’s polishing fine wares when she really trying to alleviate the pressure in her lower pelvis, the tension of her stomach.

“Is it—”

Snaps her head to him, wishing he was One and knew when to read her tones with four years of greater expertise, and then simultaneously feeling guilty because he’s him and the other two were only copies that learned to develop personalities of their own. “This child is not biologically related to you in any manner.”

“Then whose baby—”

“Is that really of the greatest importance right now?” The lightheadedness she’s been fighting since the gruesome scene in the hallway is becoming more prominent and she’s hot again, so she turns her head in against the cold limestone constructing the ruin walls but finds that it’s heated as well.

“Well.” Adjusts her jacket over his lap and starts to mellow in his unexpected nudity. His hands clasp together, and he has a pestering grin on his face. “I do have four years of information to catch up on.”

“Now’s not the time for that conversation.”

“Then there’s the fact that you look like crap.” His bare feet kick a bit, heels bouncing off the side of the stone. “And the fact that you’re pretty pregnant—”

“Excuse you, I’m only five months—”

“—and you’re still out in the field, which raises a number of bigger questions that are a little more concerning.”

“Fortunately for me, Daniel, what’s happening within my body is of no direct concern to you.” It’s getting harder to stand, harder to continue to have the conversation in the wake of the never-ending stream of nausea she’s been experiencing since arriving at the ruins.

“Then who else is going to tell you that you can’t keep making dumb decisions in your—”

Doesn’t get to hear the end of his patronizing sentence comparing her carrying a child to some farfetched illness preventing her mobility and sanity, because she slides down the wall, half able to steer herself, albeit, a little less than gently to the ground, passing out.

 

 


End file.
